This year, the NCCE and its volunteers will move across the length and breadth of the country to exceed their visit of 8,000 schools last year to hit 10,000 selected schools.

Citizenship Week is an annual flagship programme of the NCCE dedicated to educate and sensitise pupils to good sanitation practices and issues of national concern of relevance to the 1992 Constitution.

It was instituted in 2012 and celebrated each year to engender civic consciousness among young citizens of the country. This year’s celebration is on the theme “A Clean Ghana, Our Responsibility”.

The issue of sanitation

Speaking in an interview with the Daily Graphic to throw more light on the theme for the celebration, the Chairperson of the NCCE, Ms Josephine Nkrumah, said the issue of sanitation was high on the agenda of the Commission because of the adverse effects of plastic waste and filth on the environment.

She said filth continued to engulf the country’s cities and towns and more worrying was the indiscriminate disposal of plastic waste with its attendant flooding, loss of lives and properties anytime it rained.

“It is the duty of all citizens to contribute in making Ghana a clean place through sustainable public education and awareness creation as well as change in lifestyle with respect to the use and disposal of plastics,” she stated.

Ms Nkrumah, therefore, called on Ghanaians to make conscious choices on products because the kinds of products they patronised had a bearing on the environment.

She urged Ghanaians to choose biodegradable products over plastics and other products that destroyed the environment.

Mindset shift

To do that, she said, involved a mindset shift to be conscious of the role all played as global citizens.

“We need to understand that humanity has gradually destroyed the environment and the youth must spearhead this change to reverse the damaging trend to our ecosystems,” she pointed out.

In view of that she called on all Ghanaians to play their role in making Ghana a clean country by contributing to reducing plastics and choosing biodegradables.

“Citizens are being encouraged to choose alternative packaging for food, foodstuffs and beverages such as paper shopping bags, baskets, reusable bowls, flasks and water bottles to help phase out the use of polythene and other plastics” she said, adding that “as global citizens, it behoves on us to play our part and commit to helping build Ghana and achieve these goals by the year 2030.”

She said Ghana’s fight to address sanitation issues was in line with Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6 which entreats all to “Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all and Goal 14 which demands that “we conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources to drive global systems to make the earth habitable for humankind.”

Ms Nkrumah said the implementation of the 2019 Citizenship Week had been made possible with support from the European Union (EU).